


Humble Beginnings

by sleepycryptid



Category: Shepherds of Haven (Interactive Fiction), Shepherds of Haven - Lena Nguyen
Genre: Fighting, Gen, I wrote this for me I’m just posting it where others can read it lol, Slight Violence, a characterization piece more than anything else, a few years before maybe, broken bone mention, just my mc before the main story starts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-30
Updated: 2020-10-30
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:22:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27274123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sleepycryptid/pseuds/sleepycryptid
Summary: To be reborn, first you must die
Kudos: 2





	Humble Beginnings

**Author's Note:**

> I might write more in the future with her but there’s really no mention of any of the ro’s here. It’s purely to explore what kind of person she was before she met everyone.

_To be reborn—_

_first, you must die._

There are billions of stars in the sky, she thinks, and her feet scrape and skid at the ground in her clumsy dance to rebalance while the white spots exploding in her vision blot out most of the world around her. What’s a few hundred more?

The right side of her jaw whines in protest when she tests it out; a quick flex of the muscles is enough to tell her that nothing is broken. It’ll be a hell of a bruise, though, the dull ache promises.

_Good_.

For a few more moments her balance is shaky, as if she stands on the legs of a newborn fawn wobbling, stumbling under its mother’s watchful eye somewhere deep amongst the trees. She leans heavily against the brick of a building, and it’s ironic how ancient she feels, by comparison.

So far from home and yet she carries it wherever she goes—Zori, her father, and a hundred others whose stolen years weigh her down more than her own could ever until her back threatens to bend like those of the elderly women she sometimes sees hobbling along on canes, or whose bodies have withered so that they are confined to their beds. Every night she wonders if it is finally catching up to her, and every morning those cursed burning eyes stare back from some dingy inn’s bathroom mirror, ringed with the sunken shadow of exhaustion.

She’s long since grown weary of the view.

“You Diminished make me sick...”

She doesn’t fight the hand that fists itself in the shoulder of her shawl, yanking her away from the wall so suddenly that her head bounces off of it and sends her brain rattling inside her skull like a bit of loose change. Her mouth twists up into a one of those charming, unaffected grins. It’s a mask she’s grown accustomed to slipping on among strangers—and lately, everyone is always a stranger. It happens when you’re on the road all the time.

Those glowing, pale green eyes watch him from their corners—she lets her aching head loll against the shoulder he isn’t lifting her by, standing on her toes to support herself just enough to stay standing on her own.

“Think you can just help yourself to other people’s belongings, do ya?” He gives her a good shake, and she gives a breezy little chuckle that succeeds only in fanning the flames of his rage. It takes half a second for the cool edge of a knife to press into the skin of her throat, sending a thrill down her spine despite all her bravado.

“Real funny, yeah?”

She glances down, eyes flicking towards the blade so quickly it almost makes her dizzy. “Knife” might be an understatement—the blade looks about half the length of her forearm. Her eyes flash in the moonlight—her grin sharpens to a point.

“And I thought you were just happy to see me...”

Her body hits the ground hard, teeth chattering in her skull. The man is already built like an ox, but crumpled on the ground before him he seems big as a mountain, glowering down on her like some baleful god about to exact his punishment. She turns her head and spits—it does nothing to rid her of the tang of metal in her mouth.

His boot buries itself in her ribs, and there’s a crack that makes her want to vomit. Still, she bites down on the inside of her cheek and swallows her groan of pain until her smile is more of a grimace. When she reaches to push herself up, his boot comes down painfully slow on her arm until the bone creaks.

“Mouthy bitch.” He snarls, hate blackening his tone. “Bet no one would even miss you.”

They always try for more than they deserve, she muses. She sees the shadow of him on the ground, swallowing her up, and only when it raises its dark bladed arm does she bother to fight back.

Really, _fight_ isn’t the word for what she does.

Her eyes meet his, burn into them stonily without an ounce of the indignity one might expect from someone bruised and bloody and broken on the floor. Defiance, spite, even a touch of arrogance, and absolutely nothing to match the pathetic state she is in. She does not blink, and after a moment he can’t. Perhaps she couldn’t have been bothered to contend with him physically—but in a battle of wills she knows there are few who can stand against her sheer audacity, and the magic that runs through her veins.

It’s only moments, and yet for him it must seem like hours—her gaze sucks him into a void he cannot hope to escape from. She doesn’t know what he sees there; doesn’t know if he sees anything. What matters is that she can feel the weight of his inadequacy bearing down on him full force as she bends it to her own means, tugging loose every single vulnerability and hidden shame until his self-perceived flaws bury him like a toppled house of cards.

She lifts her chin, an empress dismissing him from her court of dirt and mud, and he crumbles in the face of her.

“S-Sorry...” he whimpers, hunched in on himself like a vampire cowering from the sun, “I’m so...I’m sorry...”

And then he scampers out of their little alleyway rendezvous, leaving her where she sits.

She leans backwards until the cool cobblestone tingles through her shawl, nibbling pleasantly at her shoulders. Above her the moon winks from behind the clouds as if it is in on her secret, and she pats the bulging pouch that lies hidden beneath her clothes. Getting it back is somehow always second to punishing her for swiping it in the first place, at least when she lets herself get caught. 

Keeps things fresh.

She’ll have to leave once the sun rises. She keeps her magic mostly under wraps now that she’s away from the circle, but it’s never a good idea to stick around too long after using it even once. Magic of the mind is easier to miss, but even so.

She could pick herself up off the ground and make her way back to her room at the inn, but the cool stone soothes the ache that has set in in absence of adrenaline and even if healing isn’t her forte she can at least tell that there isn’t anything life-threateningly wrong with her. It wouldn’t matter if she just...rested here a while.

“If only you all could see me now...”

Bitter amusement colors her words as she offers them up to the sparkling sky. Mind dulled on the cusp of sleep, she wonders idly who she means to address. She’s left so many people in the dust by now...always for their own good. She’s found it doesn’t pay to get too close to her.

She lets her eyes fall shut, letting the dull melody of her injuries carry her off to sleep like a lullaby. She hopes in vain that she will wake up as someone else.

_To be reborn, first you must die._


End file.
